Getting to Know Simmons Foods

An investigative report from RevealNews.org tells us Simmons Foods – one of the largest pet food co-packers in the U.S. – utilizes court ordered rehab participants as employees. The rehab is not state licensed, ’employees’ are not paid a salary and Simmons does not pay workers’ compensation insurance, payroll taxes or medical care.

When Menu Foods was found to be the manufacturing source of the deadliest pet food recall in history (2007), the Menu Foods pet food reputation was destroyed. No pet owner wanted pet food manufactured at Menu. Three years later Menu Foods sold their pet food plants to Simmons Foods for a reported $239 million. Little was heard of Simmons since the 2010 purchase of Menu, that is until an investigative story was recently published on RevealNews.org.

The following information comes from an investigation by RevealNews.org – “Reveal interviewed scores of former participants and employees, court officials and judges and reviewed hundreds of pages of court documents, tax filings and workers’ compensation records.”

The worst day of Brad McGahey’s life was the day a judge decided to spare him from prison. Standing in a tiny wood-paneled courtroom in rural Oklahoma in 2010, he faced one year in state prison. The judge had another plan. “You need to learn a work ethic,” the judge told him. “I’m sending you to CAAIR.”

CAAIR stands for “Christian Alcoholics & Addicts in Recovery”. The CAAIR website states“The CAAIR Recovery Center was created on one basic idea; to provide every man an equal opportunity to achieve a life free from addiction.”

At CAAIR, about 200 men live on a sprawling, grassy compound in northeastern Oklahoma, and most work full time at Simmons Foods Inc., a company with annual revenue of $1.4 billion. They slaughter and process chickens for some of America’s largest retailers and restaurants, including Walmart, KFC and Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen. They also make pet food for PetSmart and Rachael Ray’s Nutrish brand.

But the CAAIR organization is not a licensed rehab facility.

Drug courts in Oklahoma are required to send defendants for treatment at certified programs with trained counselors and state oversight. CAAIR is uncertified. Only one of its three counselors is licensed, and no state agency regulates it.

It was started in 2007 by chicken company executives struggling to find workers. By forming a Christian rehab, they could supply plants with a cheap and captive labor force while helping men overcome their addictions.

In fact, the RevealNews.org story appears to show CAAIR is little more than a court ordered work camp. The companies who utilize CAAIR ‘clients’ don’t “have to pay workers’ compensation insurance, payroll taxes or medical care.” The court ordered CAAIR ‘clients’ are required to work full time (mainly for Simmons Foods) for no pay.

At some rehabs, defendants get to keep their pay. At CAAIR and many others, they do not.

Simmons Foods now is so reliant on CAAIR for some shifts that the plants likely would shut down if the men didn’t show up, according to former staff members and plant supervisors.

The program has become an invaluable labor source. Over the years, Simmons Foods repeatedly has laid off paid employees while expanding its use of CAAIR. Simmons now is so reliant on the program for some shifts that the plants likely would shut down if the men didn’t show up, according to former staff members and plant supervisors.

Men who were injured while at CAAIR rarely receive long-term help for their injuries. That’s because the program requires all men to sign a form stating that they are clients, not employees, and therefore have no right to workers’ comp. Reveal found that when men got hurt, CAAIR filed workers’ comp claims and kept the payouts. Injured men and their families never saw a dime.

Simmons operates 3 hatcheries and 2 feed mills which supply nearly 300 independent poultry growers and 20+ company managed farms who raise approximately 200 million chickens per year. Our 6 processing plants produce 750 million pounds of finished product per year for customer brands around the world.

Simmons Pet Food operates 3 wet pet food production facilities, a dry pet food facility and a treats production facility. These operations are located in the United States including Northwest Arkansas, Kansas, New Jersey and in Ontario, Canada.

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Comment18

Hannie
Oct 11, 2017

Only one I ever bought was Castor Pollux canned……now I know better. All the others that I found that are made there I don’t buy anyway. I found the list, provided by you (once again, thank you Susan for all you do) & now I know which ones to avoid. I’d rather manufacture my fur baby’s food……:-)

I don’t know if this is 100% of who they manufacture but this list was shared on my Facebook page:
Canidae can
Castor Pollux Can
Life’s Abundance Can
Nature’s Logic Can
Ol’ Roy Can
Dogswell can
Evolve can
Petcurean can
Nature’s Variety can

Thanks, I’m still not on FB so I miss that stuff. From the video posted below the President and COO of Simmons states they are producing 3600 SKUs or individual products so it is pretty massive and extensive.

Do you still do those certifications? I forget what they are called, but pet food manufacturers filled out a form stating what their ingredients are and where they are sourced. I looked on the website and couldn’t find those. Anyway, you might want to include the packing plant as part of the info if you still do those.

All pet food labels should state who actually makes the food and where. If supposed pet food companies are not making their own food then the label should state who is making it. This should not be a guessing game. Pet food companies that don’t make their own food are actually just marketing companies and that should be more transparent on the label.

You are so right but this is all a big secret & always has been……at one time I had a comprehensive list that I got back in ’07 during the recalls on one of the pet websites but I have no clue where it is now or if it’s even current. At least Susan has given you a list of where canned is made. Yuk. Susan has put together a fairly comprehensive list: http://truthaboutpetfood.com/who-makes-what-in-pet-food/ & as usual we have her to thank……

If what you ask for was put in place… there would pretty much be almost nothing to choose from, we would be rejecting everything! What a world that would be!

We must examine the social phenomena, wherein consumers simply have been trained to turn away from these issues. If consumers better understood the issues (realities) of co-packing, I wonder what we would all want to buy?

Susan, thank you times infinity for your constant investigative reporting!! This is absolutely terrible and we need to know so that we can affect their bottom line…only way to make change happen with huge companies.
My head is always spinning the past few years when it comes to simply purchasing quality, TRUSTWORTHY food for the family. I usually go to your Pledge to Quality and Origin, making decisions from there.
A company like Natures Logic (Simmons) that is always providing full transparency to anyone who asks a question makes for feeding peace. Now one has to wonder if the extra profits being made at Simmons trickle down to those who use them too? Does it cost less to be manufactured there vs. say Performance just to name another that I am familiar with?
Are those on your list of being manufactured at Simmons aware of this? If they do walk thrus, are on top whatsoever of what is going on with their private label manufacturing/canning like H&G is for example as you have mentioned in the past, do they realize what you say themselves- the type of labor that is going into the processing of their own foods? Do owners of say Natures Variety talk to the folks working the line ever? I try to stay clear of unfair labor practice manufactured items, easy to think Chinese, Thai, child labor etc. as they come to mind first…but hmmm, right here at home too…so much of your reporting should make it to the national nightly news to open more folks’ eyes, thank you again Susan!

I get that Simmons’ operations are not much different to the sweat shops around the world and they’ve taken evil advantage of the addicts who were legally sentenced rather than jailed and I do applaud your investigative reporting on the subject. But what I was also interested in was whether the products from Simmons were pet safe? Were there any rendered additives from China or elsewhere included in their products and so on?

Google “Dead Pets Don’t Lie.” You will totally freak out. They put millions of dead dogs, cats, road kill, cows with maggots, chickens with cancer and tumors in dog and cat food, flea collars and all. It’s called “rendering.” There are NO regulations against this.